“What are you doing here!? How dare you sneak up and spy on me!?” Cassiopia stammered.
“Sorry, but that’s part of my job you know—professional sneaking,” Markman replied, stifling a laugh.
“How did you get in here anyway?”
“The same way you did--down the ladder.”
“You’re not supposed to be here. You said you were leaving.”
“I asked you to call me if you found anything. I didn’t say I was leaving.”
“Well, you led me to believe you were.”
“And you led me here. What, are you trying to hide something?”
“No!”
“Just what is this place, anyway?”
“I...I really don’t know exactly.”
“You didn’t know about this room?”
“No, actually I did not.”
Markman approached the robot and stood gazing in wonderment at it. “Well, I’d say this is no toy-store robot.”
“Don’t touch it. It’s far more than that. It’s almost beyond state of the art actually,” she replied hesitantly.
“Something pretty expensive even for a well-known scientist. I’m sure he’s not paying for it with payroll deduction.”
Cassiopia became quiet, suddenly afraid for her father.
“And even though I’m not very technical, I do recognize that industrial mainframe computer over there,” he continued, turning to nod in the direction of the conspicuous tower-like stacks.
“How do you know about such a thing?”
“Military Intelligence uses them. So does the FBI.” His attention turned to the monolith in the center of the room. He walked to it and cautiously climbed the blue, matted ramp. He removed one hand from his pocket and touched the coarse white material that filled the area within the electronics-riddled frame.
“Please Mr. Markman. You really shouldn’t touch anything. It could be dangerous.”
“Do you have any idea what this is?”
“No, none at all.”
“Looks like some kind of weird door to me. I’d say we do have a situation here, Ms. Cassell.” He bent forward for a last close look at the surface of the monolith, then stepped off the ramp and faced her. His eyes were deep blue and piercing. She felt as if he was almost able to read her thoughts.
“What do you mean?”
“Several million dollars worth of hardware hidden away here, and the only person that we know of connected with it is missing. This sure looks like high-level government crap, or espionage, or something like that. Something way out of my league, and yours too, if you don’t mind my saying”
“But it’s possible my father is just off somewhere doing something and has forgotten to check in. He has done that before.”
“That doesn’t mean we’re not in way over our heads here, does it?” Markman surveyed the room again. It looked barren except for the scattered electronics consoles that lined the rough gray walls. “I don’t see a single notebook anywhere. Wouldn’t he have kept records?”
“He considers his own free time so valuable he generally only keeps computer files, and even then it’s usually voice entries.” Cassiopia turned to the TEL 100D. “It would be an intrusion of course, and there may be access codes blocking us, but if anything could tell us where he might be, I’ll bet this could.”
“The thing might be dangerous.”
“Absolutely not! They are research machines. They wouldn’t have the faintest idea how to respond to violence. To program such a machine for violence would be unthinkable.”
“Well, gosh, the military would never do anything like that. Duh…!”
“That’s nonsense. A machine that powerful could easily misinterpret someone’s actions and respond harmfully. There is no way to give it that kind of authority.” Cassiopia went to the robot and flipped open a small chest plate near its neck. Small indicator lamps inside flashed at random, matching a pattern of similar lamps on the robot’s base station.
“Are you sure about this?”
“It’s my specialty, Mr. Markman,” she replied, smiling to herself at the thought of finally having the irreverent investigator at a disadvantage. “That convention I went to? It was a robotics seminar. I helped set it up. Most recently I’ve been working on a neural net for exactly this type of application. I’ve been toying with robots since I was seven years old. Of course, we won’t know how the programming on this one is set up, but there are generics in most voice recognition.”
“I’ll just stand back out of the way.”
“These machines are always on unless the power core is removed, but even then, all the programming is preserved indefinitely.” Cassiopia tapped a few keys on the robots keypad and stepped back. The robot’s visor began to glow. With a subtle whirring sound, its head moved downward and then to the left, stopping to stare at Cassiopia. “Standby. User verification.” A moment later it spoke again, “Pattern model match. Good evening, Miss Cassell. Please state your full name for voice pattern recognition.”
“Cassiopia Cassell.”
“Voice pattern recognition complete. Identity confirmation complete. Self-checks complete. Ambulatory checks complete.”
Markman stared. Cassiopia smiled, feeling admiration and pride, even though none of this magnificent technology was her own. “T-E-L, step forward.”
Markman jerked further out of the way as the robot’s large, complex legs moved gracefully from their custom-fitted platform to a faint sound of whirring motors and escaping vacuum. He cursed under his breath, embarrassed by his reaction, but quickly forgot it as the robot stepped forward and stood under its own power.
“It’s magnificent,” Cassiopia murmured
“If you say so,” he replied, “but I want you to know, if that thing goes berserk, I’ll bet I beat you to the ladder.”
With a cynical glance at Markman she commanded, “T-E-L, say location of Dr. Cassell.”
The robot answered, “Dr. Cassell is currently in Dreamland.”
Cassiopia shook her head and looked at Markman with a puzzled expression.
“It’s saying that your father is asleep somewhere?”
“T-E-L define Dreamland,” she ordered.
“There is no current definition for Dreamland.”
Cassiopia appeared perplexed. She looked again at Markman who had inched up to stand next to her.
“T-E-L, list file entries, keyword Dreamland.”
“Files currently referencing Dreamland are: Cassell log
entries, Cassell test entries, Cassell theoretical analysis, T-E-L 100D excursion data files, T-E-L 100D analytical base.”
“Wow, what is all this about?”
“Interrogation is part of what I do,” said Markman. “Let me try. Ask it where Dreamland is.”
“T-E-L, say location of Dreamland.”
A short pause preceded the robot’s reply. “Please rephrase inquiry.”
“What in the world? T-E-L, where is Dreamland?”
The robot persisted, “Please rephrase inquiry.”
“Ask it what time your father went there.”
“T-E-L, say Dr. Cassell’s time of departure to Dreamland.”
“Dr. Cassell last entered Dreamland on zero-three, zero-nine, at zero-seven-four-five Zulu.”
“That accounts for the time he’s been missing.” Markman’s attention suddenly peaked. “Okay, ask it for directions to Dreamland.”
“T-E-L, say physical path to Dreamland.”
“Dreamland is accessed through the SCIP transformer.”
Markman frowned. “What? What is that? Sounds like a kid’s toy or something.”
Cassiopia stepped back and placed one hand partially over her mouth. “Oh my…! This is incredible! My father can’t have.... T-E-L, say location of SCIP transformer.”
“The SCIP transformer is located in the center of this laboratory, four-point-four-two-two-five meters from the north wall, five-point-five-five-one meters from the west wall as currently measured.”
Together they turned and stared at the huge white column in the center of the room. A look of sarcasm abruptly came over Markman. Cassiopia’s face flushed from shock to dismay. Her overloaded mind understood immediately. “Oh my God,” she gasped, one hand on her chest, staring at the foreboding monolith.
“Wait a minute, wait a minute, I’m not buying into this for one minute! Is that thing trying to say your father disappeared through that?”
Cassiopia cast an angry stare at Markman but did not answer.
“T-E-L, define SCIP.”
“SCIP, acronym for Spatial Corruption Interface Program, as hypothesized by Dr. H. Cassell. For further extrapolations, refer to related data files.”
“Oh, for crying out loud. I think I’m starting to get the picture here, Ms. Cassell. If you think anyone is going to be stupid enough to fall for something as ridiculous as this, you are the one in dreamland. I’m insulted that you would even think I’d believe any of this crap.”
Cassiopia ignored him. She placed one hand on her forehead and began to mumble to herself. “He’s been conducting revolutionary research in complete secrecy--even from me! The work clearly has been dangerous, yet he’s been doing it without any backup at all, except for the robot. He made sure I had access to the lab, but even that wasn’t very obvious. That must’ve been in case he got into trouble. That means he’s in trouble.” She looked up worriedly. “What? What did you say? Mr. Markman, I really don’t give a damn what you think.”
“Well then let me tell you what I think, Ms. Cassell. I think this very expensive equipment around us is probably stolen, or illegal, or something. For one reason or another the bill has come due so to speak, so in an effort to avoid facing charges, you and your father have arranged this amusing little publicity stunt to explain his disappearance. Sound familiar so far...? I expect that this doorway-thing here is about as real as any good movie prop and can do just about as much, sealing the poor Professor’s fate forever. No one to prosecute. No one to blame. How’m I doing, Ms. Cassell?”
Cassiopia flushed with anger. With a piercing stare she returned his harsh tone, “Well then, let’s just see about that, shall we?”
Chapter 5